I'll Fly Away Like a Pigeon
by Sarah LoTuS
Summary: Lee doesn’t want to be just a notch on Kara’s bedpost. Became completely and utterly AU when I was writing it, but oh well. This is pre-mini, but has a spoiler for season 3.0. Heavy on smut, light on plot.


AN: This was a gift for stardust_20 (aka Tracyj23) in the dwficexchange on LJ. Thanks to Cam for listening to me angst on about this in chat when she doesn't even like Kara/Lee. And for the title, many thanks. (Also, I would like to point out that I settled on the title before seeing the finale. I think it fits even more now, but it reminds me of the ending, so it makes me sad, too!

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I'll Fly Away (Like A Pigeon)

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"You know what, Kara?" Lee asks her one day at lunch, a glint in his eye.

She doesn't look up, preoccupied with her flight manual. "Hmm?"

"I think I might be the only man in our year that you haven't spent the night with."

She blinks at him, contemplating whether to be offended or not. He's not far off the mark, after all, and she's not ashamed of it. "Feeling left out?" she asks.

"Not at all," he scoffs. "I'm not interested in being a notch on your bedpost, Starbuck. Besides, it's not like you haven't tried," he taunts.

"That doesn't count," she protests. "I was drunk out of my skull and I thought you were Helo!"

He chuckles. "It _would_ explain why you were a leering at a spot a foot above my head."

She rolls her eyes. "I don't leer—you must have me confused with someone else." She gets an idea; closing her book and bringing her lips close to his ear, she purrs, "Besides, how do you know I'm not saving the best for last?"

He manages not to shiver at her closeness. "Flattery will get you nowhere, Kara."

"Whatever." She shrugs her shoulders. "Your loss." She gathers up her books and leaves him there.

He thinks that's the end of it.

~ * ~

Lee cradles his spinning head in his hands and sighs deeply. This is certainly _not_ how he envisioned his last night at the academy; cooling his heels in the brig after being dragged into a barroom brawl by a certain blonde hell raiser. Drunk and disorderly; even if the notation _doesn't_ go into his permanent record, he is damned sure his father will find out.

She's in the cell across from his, either sprawled on the tiny excuse for a rack with a stogie (he really doesn't want to know how she managed to get that past the routine search) or methodically doing push-ups—he refuses to glance over and see for himself. In fact, he should probably never speak to her again. She is a bad influence.

What the frak is he doing here? He really should know better than to drink whatever Starbuck puts in front of him. He refuses to believe he got this drunk all by himself. She had to have been topping up his glass when he wasn't looking. Or maybe she slipped him a mickey? He certainly wouldn't put it past her. Evil wench. Unfortunately, there's nothing he can do about it now—done is done. All he can do is stretch out and try to sleep this off.

He's not sure how much later it is when he wakes. It's not morning yet; still dark as a tomb, and his mind is still cloudy, so it can't be too much later. He wonders what woke him.

A shadow moves almost too quickly for him to see, and a hand covers his mouth. He stops wondering.

"Sshhhh!" she warns him, in a very _loud_ whisper, followed by a giggle. She's still drunk, too. Her hand slides away from his mouth, creeps down his chest and begins to tickle at the hem of his tanks.

He opens his mouth to say something—demand an explanation or beg her to continue, he's not sure—but before he can get a word out she's straddling him and her tongue is burrowing deep and words are completely beyond him.

She tastes warm and sweet, just like the fine Caprican whiskey they've both been drinking, mixed with a hint of bitter Picon tobacco. He knows there is a reason he shouldn't be allowing this, but he can't quite think of it just now, so instead he pulls at the button on her trousers. She's got his zipper undone, and when her hand wraps around him he lets out an undignified noise that is not quite a squeak, but doesn't really qualify as a moan, either.

Her mouth vibrates against his, and he realises she's chuckling at him, so he pushes them both upright, shoves her tanks up over her head (leaving her to pull them the rest of the way off by herself) and latches onto a breast. She wiggles in his lap in response, threading her fingers through his hair and pressing him closer. He bites, gently, and she twitches but doesn't let go.

His right hand rests in the centre of her back, holding her to him, and his left hand remembers its job at her waist, finally working that button through the gap and finding its way into her knickers.

For the first time, it occurs to him to wonder how she got out of her own locked cell and into his. Maybe his drink-addled brain is conjuring up this whole scenario. Maybe he's been secretly fantasising it since the day he met her.

Then she sinks down on him, around him, enclosing him; and gods but this doesn't feel like a dream. Her intake of breath is just a little too slow and deliberate; he would have imagined it quicker. He'd have added a little moan; a gasp or perhaps a squeak. Instead she breathes, deeply. And begins to move.

She rides him easily, steadily, confidently; Lee's just sober enough to remember to wait for her. It's exquisite, this slow push-pull of flesh; the pressure builds up inexorably. He digs his fingers into her hips and sucks on the skin at the juncture of her neck and shoulder as she catches her breath and sighs his name like a prayer.

Kara's clenching around him and he lets go, feeling the waves wash over him as she whimpers in his arms. "Frak, Kara," he breathes as he kisses her lips again and falls backwards until his head hits something hard and lumpy.

She drops to the pallet beside him, pillowing her head on his shoulder, and Lee realises he didn't even manage to get his tanks off. He tries to stay awake, to say something, but he can't manage it. His head is still spinning, and now that his body's sated, sleep is claiming him fast.

Just before he surrenders, he thinks he hears her whisper, "You were definitely worth the wait, Apollo."

~ * ~

Lee jerks awake to the sound of his cell door being unlocked.

"Rise and shine, Adama!" Petty Officer Richard "Shark" Nelson orders cheerfully, before turning and unlocking Kara's cell opposite. "You too, Thrace."

"Frak me, Shark, can't a girl get a decent night's sleep in the brig these days?" Kara complains. She winces at the bright lights overhead and Lee gets a sudden vivid flash of her manic grin hovering over him last night. Had she—? Had they—?

It must have been a dream. A drunken fantasy. Logic reminds him she's been locked in a separate cell the entire night. Then again, he was _very_ drunk. Maybe it happened before all that and he's mixed it up in his head?

He tries to get a glimpse of her shoulder, remembering possibly biting her there, but her jacket is covering the spot. She catches him looking and raises an eyebrow. "Are you okay?" she asks. "You seem a little distant."

"Fine," he shrugs. "Remind me never to go drinking with you again, Starbuck."

She laughs. "You enjoyed it," she accused him. "Admit it."

He eyes her speculatively, but her triad face has always been too inscrutable and he can't get a thing from it. "How should I know?" he complains. "All I know is that bastard had one hell of a right hook, and I now have a D&D on my record."

"Don't complain, Lee. It makes you more human." They sign the paperwork and finally they're free to go.

"Thanks for the accommodation, Shark," she calls as they leave. "I owe you one!"

"You owe me more than one, Starbuck," he replies. Lee's not sure, but he thinks Shark is giving him a knowing look.

He watches her carefully for days after that, looking for some sign that it actually happened, but she is like a butterfly; always flitting away, never letting him catch her.

A week later he ships out to War College and the further away it gets, the more he is sure it _was_ a fantasy.

A few months later, when she starts getting serious with his little brother, he carefully exorcises it from his mind. And if he occasionally sees something in the way she looks at him; speculation, perhaps, or some sort of knowing that comes from having once been intimate with someone; he keeps it to himself.

It's not until years later, under the giddy moon of New Caprica that he's sure it wasn't a dream. His body recognises hers, even if his memories aren't clear. They've been here before.

As she pillows her head on his shoulder and they both drift to sleep, he remembers the words of the scriptures he doesn't believe in. _All of this has happened before. And all of this will happen again._

The next morning he wakes alone.

~ * ~


End file.
